Nepal Social Work Symposium is an annual flagship event organized by the School of Social Sciences, Thames International College. The grand event aims to bring together distinguished personalities to deliberate upon issues broadly in line with the annual theme set by The Global Agenda for Social Work and Social Development (The Agenda). The event was structured under the theme 'Promoting the Importance of Human Relationships.' The event took place on June 7th and 8th 2018 respectively.
Every year, the two-day event is organized to assemble distinguished personalities and expatiate upon the subjects in line with the annual theme. The Social Work Symposium, which was successfully organized, in 2017, facilitated an informed discussion on the issues of promoting community and environmental sustainability in Nepal and beyond from various perspectives uninhibited by any boundaries, disciplinary or otherwise. The two-day symposium featured stand-alone presentations, panel discussions and workshops from eminent personalities. The speakers included academics and public intellectuals, civil society leaders, civil servants, politicians, non-profit professionals, social workers, columnists, environment journalists, and political analysts. Nepal Social Work Symposium 2018 had a series of interesting events which engaged the audience and conveyed evocative messages. Programs such as Slam Poetry, book talk, and panel discussions were the highlights of the event.
The two-day event was allocated into plenary sessions - Slam poetry, Workshops, and Panel discussions. The first day of the event consisted of three plenary sessions, slam poetry and a screening.
The first plenary session was presented by Mr. Ghana Shyam Gurung, country representative of WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature). As the relationship between humans and nature evolves, there are two prospects that may ascend. The first is when humans realize and take care of the environment and the second where humans recklessly and selflessly utilize the privileges nature has given to us. With reference to this theme, Mr. Gurung conducted a session on "Conservation with Human Face" as the opening session on June 7, 2018. The session gave us insights on how recent development activities such as road and dam constructions are leading towards the destruction of nature and the environment as well.
Ms. Nasala Chitrakar conducted an enthralling session that consisted of a series of slam poetry called "Words Strings Together". Ms. Chitrakar, along with five other participants portrayed the power of words elevated through one's emotions. Some of the issues presented in the slam poetry were associated with pollution, underdevelopment, corruption, and the quest for progress.
The third plenary session was conducted by Mr. Narayan Wagle who is a prominent novelist and a journalist. Under the theme "Development through the eyes of a Journalist", he talked about how he envisions development from a journalist's standpoint. Mr. Wagle elaborated on the adverse effects of development and further expressed concerns about modern trials of development in Nepal.
The final session of the first day of the Nepal Social Work Symposium concluded with two prolific workshops. After back-to-back plenary sessions, Mr. Manoj Pandit conducted a movie-making workshop and a Proposal Writing workshop simultaneously. It was held by The International School of Advanced Studies and Society (ISAS).
The second day of the Nepal Social Work Symposium dated June 8th 2019 began with a plenary session on the theme Reservation and Marginalized Community. Ms Ila Sharma, commissioner at the Commission of Nepal discoursed on democracy and provided insights on affirmative action, reservation, marginalization and important roles of election for minorities.
Following the plenary session, the next program was a Book Talk conducted by Mr. CK Lal, an author, engineer, journalist and political analyst. Author Lalduring the book talk shared his experiences on how the book was derived from his very own book namely "Nepaliya Hunalai". The theme of talk was centered on Nationality and what it means to be a 'Nepalese'. He discussed on Nationality and Nationalism, where the talk gave us insights of an idea of Nation State.
A documentary screening took place post book talk which was conducted by Mr. Nischal/Nirjal Poudyal. The documentary reconnoitre the livelihood of people from Nurkhum village which lies at the height of 4000m above sea level. The documentary exemplified insights of the last Sherpa family holding the traditional Sherpa profession of Mountain Cow husbandry. The documentary attempted to showcase the hardships in Everest for the Last Sherpa family.
With the objective of underlining the theme 'Corruption, Underdevelopment and Nepal', we had various eminent personas to discourse about corruption, development in Nepal and its effects. The closing session of the Nepal Social Work Symposium 2018 consisted of a panel discussion with Ms Sama Thapa as a moderator.
The speakers were:
An hour-long panel discussion reconnoitered the importance of youth involvement in contemporary politics and challenged the political culture of senior leaders of Nepal. The session discoursed corruption- its effects and consequences in our society. From inclusion to underdevelopment, youth-led politics, exploitation, and gender to bureaucracy, the discussion covered how they influence politicians and corruption. The discussion ended with possible solutions to the problems encountered by Nepal and its people today.
This marked the end of the 2018 Nepal Social Work Symposium promising to organize yet another grand event in the following year.
